Engaging the Nation in Canadian Music Conversations

There’s a room where Paul Goguen makes his music as Paranerd. I’ve never been in it, never seen it, but I’ve heard it. The décor is black light-lit basement crossed with Radio Shack circa 1982 crossed with 808 State’s Ninety. The password to get is an incomprehensible series of bleeps and squeals, the kind you find at the beginning of commercial cassettes, before the music starts. You’ll walk right by the main entrance if you’re not paying attention.

The place is not a clubhouse, but it smells like a club. The lights are on, but they’re actually strobes and lasers, making it hard to see. Oh, and there’s smoke–no, not smoke, fog–the kind that tastes like cotton candy and moves like clouds. I’m feeling claustrophobic, but it’s spacious, with one room flowing into the next without a clearly delineated boundary.

Writ EP is just that, an extended play of moody melodies, reluctant to show their faces, set to the staccato rhythms of drum and bass, wearing the most brilliant of jackets. Calling tracks “Weqcs,” “Wockx,” “Wakcz,” and “Walxc” makes saying their names just about as hard as describing them, which is just as well, because the best way to get into Paranerd’s head is to put on a pair of headphones and let him into yours first.

Jim founded the music blog Quick Before It Melts in 2006 and was its principal writer until 2016, when its decade-long run ended 10 years to the day it started. DOMINIONATED is its spiritual successor. Jim currently serves as a Polaris Music Prize jurist and Prism Prize jurist.